Beyonce Gives Shoutout to Chicago's Heritage Bicycles on Her Site

Beyonce, in a screenshot from her "Blow" video. The Queen B "spotlights" local custom bike shop Heritage on her site this week.
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Beyonce "Blow" Video/Beyonce.com

LAKEVIEW — Beyonce might just be crazy in love with local bike shop Heritage.

The Grammy-winning superstar posted a "spotlight" to the store on her site and blog, Beyonce.com.

"She loves to ride bikes herself and the custom feature of Heritage where you can build your own bike is extremely cool," Beyonce's pulicist, Yvette Noel-Schure, told DNAinfo Chicago.

DNAinfo Managing Editor Shamus Toomey chats with DNAinfo Radio about Beyonce and her love of Heritage Bicycles:

Beyonce.com's post flashes photos of Heritage's various bike offerings, and when a mouse hovers over the image, "Spotlight on Heritage Bicycles" pops up in Beyonce's signature pink font. The image links directly to Heritage's website.

"We were dumbfounded," Heritage's owner Michael Salvatore said with a laugh. "We weren't sure whether or not someone was playing a joke on us. It came out of nowhere. What's going on? How did that happen?"

Salvatore noticed the spotlight after seeing a spike in traffic to their website from Beyonce.com Wednesday. The number of people visiting the site more than tripled, he said, and people were still visiting from Beyonce's site Thursday.

Heritage makes all its custom bikes in Chicago. The shop, at 2959 N. Lincoln Ave., doubles as a cafe with coffee and pastries. It recently opened a store aimed for the younger crowd, Heritage Littles, 2868 N. Lincoln Ave., and soon will be opening an outpost of Heritage in Uptown.

The popular spot has attracted the attention of people in local entertianment as well. Lyric Opera's "The Sound of Music" uses custom vintage-looking bikes for the von Trapp kids to ride on stage.

But the Queen B's endorsement "came out of nowhere," Salvatore said.

Salvatore said he's a fan, but admits he doesn't own any of her albums or listen to her regularly. Now, he's definitely a fan.

"We said, 'Let's try to get her a bike'," he said. "Get her one of our kids balance bikes for Blue Ivy. I would love to."